Two Precious Scroll Narratives of Guanyin and Her ... - Khamkoo

28 Introduction
cises achieves buddhahood). Once they have acquired these powers,
they return to the world to secretly assist their families, who are
being punished for their former evil deeds by sickness and poverty.
By feeding their families with the products of their achievement,
Shun and Miaoshan show their magnanimity and manifest their
power in all its glory.
I do not intend to suggest that The Precious Scroll of Incense
Mountain at any stage modeled itself on the Tale of the Son Shun.
The Precious Scroll of Incense Mountain is a much more developed
story than the occasionally clumsy Tale of the Son Shun. Moreover,
the ideological orientation of these two texts is diametrically opposed:
if Miaoshan is the epitome of Buddhism, Shun as the future
emperor is the exemplar of Confucianism: as soon as he has a
chance, he retreats to his room to study the Analects and the Classic
of Filial Piety. But a few incidents in The Precious Scroll of Incense
Mountain do seem to echo some in the Tale of the Son Shun. For
instance, the dragon that digs a tunnel for Shun reappears in The
Precious Scroll of Incense Mountain, where he bores a well for
Miaoshan after she is ordered to do all the kitchen work in the
White Sparrow Convent. But it is especially the structural parallels
that I find striking. One wonders to what extent this common pattern
may reflect an ancient tradition of shamanistic initiation (domination
of desire, of fire and water, voluntary death, and solitary
retirement to a mountain).
The legend of Mulian incorporates some of these same structural
elements: searching for his mother Mulian three times ascends
to heaven and three times descends into hell, acquiring greater
powers with each journey. We reencounter the fires of passion in
the thirst and fire Mulian’s mother has to suffer as a hungry ghost.
But Mulian’s final descent into hell is not followed by a period of
seclusion in the wilds—although one might argue that it has been
removed to the beginning of the story, when Mulian leaves home
for a long business trip, thus unwittingly providing his mother with
an opportunity to sin. However, while the basic configuration of
characters in the Mulian legend closely resembles that of the Tale
of the Son Shun, the development of the story may well show a
greater structural parallel to the narrative ‘‘The Count of Zheng Defeats
Duan in Yan’’ (Zhengbo ke Duan yu Yan) from the Zuozhuan
(Duke Yin, year 1). As part of the Zuozhuan this story is usually
treated as sober historiography, but perhaps it is better treated as